Highiliners

by William B. McCloskey Jr.

  “You sober?” asked Jones.

  “Yes. I only had a couple of swallows.”

  “And your head ain’t joggled from that fellow’s fist?”

  “I feel just great.”

  “Take your watch for two hours, then, and I’ll get some sleep.” Jones gave him exact course instructions. “But if you see anything you can’t account for, stop the engine and I’ll be here before your hand’s off the stick. If the land fogs up, call me. I’ll hand you more coffee.”

  Hank had taken the wheel often, but never underway at night while the others slept. Nor had Jones ever waited on him. The white moon blazed on the water and outlined the black mountains. The world was incredible, just incredible!

  The radiophone crackled with the conversations of other boats. Somewhere in front of them rode the Billy II, which must have slipped away shortly after Hank left. And behind followed the Olaf—Jones had actually swapped jokes with Chip about the fight.

  “Yeah, Billy Two, this is Teddy Ann, do you have parts on board for a number three—” Static obliterated the rest.

  “Teddy Ann, this is Billy Two. Can’t hear you, switch to the next channel, okay.” More static followed. A few minutes later, the captain of the Billy II was back chatting when he interrupted himself to say, “Sky’s dark ahead, looks like a squall coming.” A few minutes later, the voice announced, “Got a thundering bastard of a squall.”

  Hank could see for himself the approaching clouds. Land was distant on all sides, but he decided to take no chances. He thumped on the deck, and in a few seconds Jones stood by his elbow.

  The wind had already begun to increase. Moonlight at their back silvered the edge of a tangible blackness that raced toward them, erasing mountains and shoreline along the corridor of the Strait. “Shit,” said Jones, “I said she might squall, but I didn’t figure it this soon or I’d have stayed back in the bay. Bucking this we don’t make Whale Pass by early slack.” Hank fetched their oilskins. They watched the squall move over them like a huge hand: first came the wind with iodine sea-smells, then isolated drops as hard and big as raisins, suddenly a torrent of rain. Behind them the white moon still glowed intact, but as he watched, layer upon layer of rain obscured it like veils until it disappeared.

  The rain was so thick around them that it reflected back the running lights like a close wall. Jones slowed and started blasting their whistle at intervals.

  “Never saw rain like this,” shouted Hank admiringly.

  “She’s a dumper. You want to listen to the way our whistle travels. If the sound bounces back, you’re close to something. Want to listen for other boats, too, because you ain’t going to see them.” Jones switched his controls to the cabin and left Hank on watch. Around one in the morning, Steve relieved him and insisted he go in. By then the pleasure of a lonely watch in the rain had grown thin, and Hank was glad to oblige. He fell asleep quickly despite the activity of Jones at the wheel between the two sides of bunks, the light on the chart spread across the engine cover, and the crackling voices on the radio.

  When he awoke it was daylight of sorts—a gray half-light sliced by rain. The boat had a steady, heavy pitch that creaked the woodwork over his head. From his bunk he gazed through the open door as the line of the stern rose against the sky, then plunged with a thud that made everything shudder. After each thud, the stern scudded sidewise and seas washed over the deck, while the horizon tilted. Then the stern shot up again with sickening speed. The water itself, seen only on the plunge, was turbulent and sluggish, with green-brown swells that had a dirty white foam on top. He closed his eyes, feeling sick, then opened them again, unable to keep from watching.

  Around ten in the morning they tied alongside the anchored Billy II in the lee of Whale Island. It was difficult to believe the calmness. Within sight of the cove where they lay flowed the whirlpool currents of Whale Pass. A few other fishing boats were also standing off, apparently waiting for slack.

  Pete received the Rondelay’s lines from Hank with a crack about their slowness, and the captain waved from the pilothouse for Jones to come join him. It was like neighbors encountering each other in far places.

  “Who’ll have some fresh salt herring?” asked Spitz, as they all settled in the warmth of the tender’s big galley.

  “Give my friend Hank some,” said Pete magnanimously. The herring had a sweet, rich, stinking-fishy flavor that Hank could at least abide. He pretended to savor it, with his eye on the berry pies as soon as he had earned them, and bugged Pete by asking for seconds.

  Spitz watched with approval. A while later he called Hank outside to show him the current through Whale Pass. From the raised deck, they could see a long stretch of the turbulent water. “She’s on max ebb right now,” Spitz declared quietly. “Take a look if you ever want to see devil’s water.”

  With the proximity binoculars gave, the water had the primitive drive of a thunderstorm. It flowed in glistening ribs, broken by whirlpools but never diverted. As Hank watched a huge log floated from the straits they had just traversed, entered the current and suddenly accelerated to four times its original speed, then was sucked under and disappeared. He whistled appreciatively.

  “What did you expect?” said Spitz with satisfaction. “You’ve got Kupreanof Strait, where you just came from, on one side and all of Marmot Bay on the other, connected by a pinhole at Whale Pass where millions of tons of water have to shoot through at each tide change. Nothing surprising about the force. It’s what happens out of sight that bothers you. Think about it. Nature moves the tides on such a regular clock with the moon that anybody with an adding machine can tally it for a century in advance, and we publish it in tide and current tables. But then, my friend, Nature exercises her prerogative of chaos over the symmetry. You can’t predict her all the way. You can say, uh-oh, northeasterly front building five hundred miles away, she’ll do this and that, to judge by past experience. But you’ll never know for sure until it’s hit, till it’s happened and over.”

  “Not necessarily chaos when we Can’t figure it.”

  “Maybe,” said Spitz reasonably, “but it’ll do for chaos. Where’s that log now, the one you watched suck under? Is it bumping along the bottom a few feet from where it disappeared, did it pass safely to be floating free now out in Marmot Bay, or has it been splintered into five thousand pieces and redistributed? It’s already happened, yet we’ll never know.” After a pause, Spitz said in a low voice, “I’ll admit it, that chaos water scares me like none other. It has forces beyond the hope of human control.”

  An hour or more passed in conversation and with the reading of comic and girlie books at the long galley table. Sputters of radio dialogue came from the pilothouse, where the two skippers were visiting. The engineer passed through, announcing that he had fixed the trouble that had made them miss the previous slack. This brought out the captain. “Okay. Were getting underway,” he announced.

  Spitz looked sharply at the clock. “It’s another two and a half hours to next slack.”

  “The marine forecast says this little northeasterly’s going to make into a gale, and I plan to get through before it starts blocking the mouth of the pass.”

  Spitz grabbed his binoculars and peered at the current. “We’re only an hour past maximum ebb. You can see it still running.”

  The captain ignored him and said to Jones, “I wouldn’t run ahead of slack like this on a dark night in a storm, but shit, we’ve got visibility. If I holed up in a cove as many times as the wind blew”—he winked— “I’d still be nothing but a cook or a deckhand.”

  The jab reached Spitz. His face reddened.

  “Sam, rev her up. Pete, haul anchor. Away we go.” The two nodded and left, without question. “You boys on the Rondelay can trail us.”

  “I reckon we’ll wait a bit,” said Jones.

  “Suit yourself. This scow’s got a real horse of an engine, and that makes a difference.”

  “But she maneuvers like a barn,” snapped Spitz
.

  The captain winked again at Jones. “Depends on who’s behind the wheel.”

  “Jones,” said Spitz, “look at the current yourself and tell this numb-nut it’s still ebbing too strong.”

  “It ain’t my judgment.”

  The engines started, their vibration shivering through the boat. “I’ll tell you guys how it’s blowing on the other side of the pass,” said the captain, his voice tighter than before. “You can just stand by your radio.”

  “We’ll do that. Mebbe see you in Kodiak tonight.”

  “Might not. You could still be here.”

  Spitz was sweating. “With that northeaster blowing since last night it doesn’t have to make into a gale. You could already have a tide rip a dozen feet high waiting at the other end of the pass, one this current’ll slam you into head-on.”

  “I’ve handled through some seas before, Mr. Spitz. I’ve never piled a boat on the rocks, like you have.”

  “Then take it from me,” Spitz cried, “it’s not worth the chance!”

  “In these waters, you don’t survive if you don’t take chances. Now that’s the end of the argument.” The captain started back toward his wheelhouse. “But, Spitz, if you want to snivel aboard the Rondelay I can get on without you.”

  Spitz stared, his thin mouth working, his fists clenched.

  “You’re welcome to ride with us,” Jones said calmly in passing. They boarded the Rondelay and waited, but Spitz did not appear. Pete threw them their lines, laughing. “I’ll tell you,” he said to Hank, “we never need TV up here with those two swiping at each other. Hope your putt-putt boat makes it through before winter.”

  Jones started their engine and trailed the Billy II as far as possible without leaving the sheltered water. They had a partial vista of the pass. The current no longer appeared to streak with the same intensity. Other boats around were still laying off.

  “Are they really taking a chance?” asked Hank, settling beside Jones on the bridge.

  “Ah, no more than most.”

  “Then why don’t you go through?”

  “I’m never in that much of a hurry. This boat’s got to see me into old age.”

  The Billy II moved slowly around the spit. With its square red housing and blunt ends it resembled a boxcar on a barge.

  “She’s a solid old workhorse; that power scow got a sturdy engine,” said Jones. The Billy II delivered a lively series of whistle blasts and Jones tooted back. A waving of arms followed between the two skippers. “Yep, I’ve known John there about ten years. He ain’t the best and he ain’t the worst.”

  Spitz opened the galley door and leaned on the rail, looking down at the water. The captain’s voice came up on the radiophone. “Yeah, Rondelay, better trail on behind, she looks calm and cool, okay.”

  “Billy Two, read her out for me on the other side.”

  “Will that, Rondelay, will that. Oh boy, we’re entering the old roller coaster.” They could see the Billy II dip forward, then start to move two or three times as fast while its stern scudded sideways. “Ah, Rondelay, you don’t get these fun rides when you play it with the slack.” A pause. “I’d judge this currents still as much as seven knots. And I’m doing another three or four minimum just to keep way. Be through here in less than ten minutes. What a ride! Little tricky, so I’ve got the wheel and Cindy’s holding the mike up to my mouth. I’ll play radio announcer. Ever go down a big ski slope, Jones, and get to moving so fast in the middle you asked yourself what the... ? Little tricky here. Just feel that bastard kick.” He laughed. “Like some kind of Loch Ness monster kicking us around from underneath. Yeah, bet you didn’t know I was a slim, trim skier in my younger days, out at Snoqualmie. Girls still find I can... Jeez, a little tricky.”

  Jones had edged the Rondelay out as close as he dared, and they were all watching. Their vista included a grass-covered island with a buoy riding nearby. The Billy II darted past so close it looked like they might have clipped the buoy, which the current pulled sideways.

  “Current wanted to take me right over there. She’s . . . uh . . . still a little strong.”

  “He should have taken Koniuji Islet wider than that, and he knows it,” said Jones quietly.

  “Maybe he ought to come back,” said Hank.

  “He can’t. Even if he had power to buck against seven knots of current, no boat could turn in that channel without being smashed on the rocks. He’s got to see it through.”

  The radio voice resumed after a long pause, this time more soberly. “Well, friends, here we are back with Lowell Thomas, shooting Niagara in a barrel.” Pause. “She’s a little rough, little hard to control. We’ll make it easy, but... Here, hold that mike steady, honey.”

  Pete’ll have some ride to bullshit about, thought Hank enviously. The Billy II, hazy from more than a mile away, glided from sight behind the rocks and trees of Whale Island.

  After a while Steve said to Jones, “Why don’t you ask him how he’s doing?”

  “He don’t need to hear from me.”

  The voice of the captain said quietly, “That northeaster’s blowing. I can see whitecaps out beyond the end of the pass, and I can see trees on shore bending. There’s white water around Ilkognak Rock. I’m steering my way clear of it, of course, but this current’s really a kicker. Jones, if you’re still listening, I don’t advise coming through right now. We’ve got good power, there’s no problem, of course, but with you ...” A wondering voice that sounded like Pete’s said, “Skipper, it. looks like a wall of water ahead.”

  Jones Henry groaned.

  “Give us binoculars, Pete.” A pause, and the captain said in a steady voice, “Jones, if you’re listening, it looks like we’re going to hit a bitch of a rip tide, maybe twenty feet high. If you’re listening, you might . . . Pete, help me hold this wheel. Just throw down the binoculars.”

  Jones scrambled below. From the cabin they could hear his voice demanding Kodiak emergency on the second radio.

  “This .. . wheel. .. won’t respond.” The voice grunted with each word. “Pete, with me. Uh! We’ve cleared the rock, thank God, but oh, my Lord! Three times higher than we are, my...”

  There was a high male scream that sounded like Spitz’s.

  “The rip’s turning us upside ... Uh, uh. Mayday, Mayday. Whale Pass. Billy—” There was a roar, then nothing but static.

  They waited on the Rondelay for more, but no more came.

  CHAPTER 9

  Boats That Go Down

  THE last transmission from the Billy II had occurred close to noon.

  By midafternoon, Swede Scorden was flying overhead in a chartered plane, while a seagoing tug and a Coast Guard cutter from Kodiak cruised the coastline. A boat in the eastern mouth of Whale Pass would never be more than a third of a mile from shore, but the searchers could report no evidence of the Billy II on the beach: neither boat, oil slick, debris, nor people. Despite the lee where the Rondelay rode calm, it was blowing fifty and gusting higher on the other side of the pass.

  Jones sped the Rondelay across the strait to moor it in the shelter of the Port Bailey cannery dock. Swede landed his seaplane to take Jones aboard. A Navy plane picked up the others and distributed them on the various search craft to help identify anything that might be found.

  Hank, his throat still tight five hours after the event, became a passenger aboard a Coast Guard buoy tender. For the remaining hours of daylight he huddled on the bridge wing with the watch as wind and rain tore about him, peering through binoculars without rest for some sign among the hazy rocks, refusing food, occasionally coughing to hide a sob as the immensity of the event returned to mind.

  It was a relief when darkness came to relieve him of the obligation to search. He was hungry and cold. Gladly he followed a sailor named Mack down the steel stairways and through steel corridors to the crew’s mess deck. In the clothes which had practically grown to his body, he felt scruffy among the men in their clean-bleached dungarees. He even began to snif
f his own odor.

  After eating, Mack took him below to a dark berthing deck where the bunks were stacked in tiers, assigned him a bunk and a locker, and issued him bedding. He took a shower. Mack loaned him clothes and he washed his own, then hung them at Mack’s direction on a line in the engine room. He watched a movie on the messdeck. Thoughts of Pete and Spitz returned often in a guilty wave, but the event was so unbelievable that the movie pulled him away. Later the captain asked him to the wardroom, where he sat among the officers at a felt-covered table and repeated the whole story of the Billy II.

  The high bunk where he finally stretched was more comfortable than any bed he had slept in since leaving home. The ship rolled and pitched, but he had hardly noticed it, so far removed was it from the slap of the sea. He thought of the raging top of the water, and the cold depths pulled by currents and inhabited by dark forms of creatures. I might have been there, he thought. Wherever they are. Our Father Which art in Heaven. . . . He stretched his body and wriggled into the warm mattress.

  The next sound he heard was a tinny shriek that rose and fell in pitch, and then over the same loudspeaker a voice droning: “Now oh-six-three-oh, reveille reveille reveille, all hands heave out and trice up. The smoking lamp is lighted in all authorized places.” Groans and coughs followed from the bunks around him, and a light snapped on in his eyes.

  He had not even dreamed! He lay thinking of the salty, regimented reveille call as he watched the men in their clean white skivvies stand on the metal deck and pull into their dungarees. Different kind of seafaring altogether. He’d take the cramped, dirty Rondelay with its wooden deck. But, putting from his mind why he was there, he dressed with the others and gladly ate a huge breakfast in the knowledge that he would not have to wash the dishes.

  On the bridge, the watch officer showed him the chart and explained their search pattern for the day. Mack appeared, saluted the officer, then took a microphone and blew a little whistle around his neck that shrilled with the same noise as the reveille. “Now all hands turn to, foul weather gear on the buoy deck.” Hank stood admiring the performance, as Mack strutted past and winked.